Signarama Celebrates Milestones During World Expo Event

Signarama, a sign and graphics franchise, recently hosted hundreds of franchisees and vendors during the United Franchise Group (UFG) World Expo in West Palm Beach, Florida. The four-day event took place at the Palm Beach County Convention Center, not far from the Signarama global headquarters.

More than 200 Signarama franchisees attended the event, which also happened to be a 35-year celebration for the brand. Franchisees learned about the latest updates in technology, product development, marketing strategies, and vendor partnerships. In addition to brand-specific content, franchisees attended sessions from UFG leadership, including CEO Ray Titus and keynote speakers.

Highlights from the 2021 convention include:

• 2020 system-wide sales reached $341 million, up from $316M in 2019.
• 63 Signarama centers qualified for inclusion in the Million Dollar Circle in 2020. Criteria for inclusion was $1 million in gross sales in the calendar year of 2020.
• The Signarama President’s Award, which recognizes a long-standing franchisee with excellent performance, contributions to the benefit of the brand, and consistent sales impact and growth, was awarded to Beatriz Cardona & Roberto Hiller in New Tampa, Florida.
• The 2020 Signarama MVP award was presented to Bob Chapa III, Signarama Troy/Metro Detroit, Michigan, for achieving over $8 million in sales in the calendar year of 2020.
• The 2020 Signarama Sign Awards Ceremony honored franchisees who produced projects across 11 categories, including the Best In Show Award presented to Jason and Cynthia Brown from Louisville, Kentucky. The team’s work included a design for local celebrity Chef Fernando Martinez’s latest restaurant concept, La Bodeguita de Mima.

In addition to the milestones and awards, Signarama set a Guinness World Records for most signatures on a banner in one hour during the event. On June 28, the brand successfully captured the needed signatures on the 25″ banner, themed “We Love Signs” to celebrate its anniversary marketing campaign. Guinness World Records adjudicator, Michael Empric, flew in for the event and was present to count each participant. He later officially announced and confirmed the record attempt totaling 689 signatures on-stage in front of all the participants. The minimum number to set this Guinness World Records title was 250.

“The 2021 World Expo event was remarkable. This was the first time that we’ve been able to gather with our franchisees for an in-person event in over a year, and to top it off; we got to celebrate 35 years in business together,” says A.J. Titus, president of Signarama and United Franchise Group. “The hard work and dedication to the brand was apparent during the awards, where we recognized a record number of award winners this year. In total, the brand gave out nearly 300 awards to Signarama franchisees from across the globe. Without our franchisees, we wouldn’t be where we are today.”

Additional awards presented at the event included:

Hall of Fame Inductees

Todd and Stephanie Cunningham: Frisco, Texas
Bryan and Katherine Duquet: Clinton Township, Michigan
Ed and Arlene Sullivan: Asheville, North Carolina

Master License Partner of the Year

Olivier and Rouba Fossat: France

Humanitarian of the Year

John and Ashly Robbins: Redding, California
Mike Ziccardi and Dawn Tiritter-Bent: Huntington Station, New York

Most Improved

Mike and Beth Powers: Flint, Michigan
Aaron Grochowski: Bloomingdale, Illinois

Rookie of the Year

Matt and Kelly Mattingly: San Antonio NW, Texas
Dan and Kendra Pearson: Lake Mary, Florida

Team Player

Ric and Karen Anderson: Salt Lake City, Utah
Alex and Sharon Fong: Redmond, Washington